08. Rashied Ali

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Rashied Ali Quintet, Studio Rivbea, NYC, 1973, 25:42

Rashied Ali – drums

Earl Cross – trumpet

James Blood Ulmer – guitar

John Dana? – bass

Lightning? – sax

Juma on James Blood Ulmer: “I had the pleasure of playing with him because over a few years he played with the Aboriginal Music Society. He played basically our music. It was an honor to play with him because he brought so much into the music as a creative artist. So we have a number of recordings with James Blood on it. I think I may have one recording of him and his band, which was another band he had, The James Ulmer Band , where we feature in concert. He was still with Ornette at the time he was playing with us.”

Earl Cross, like Sonny Simmons, Dewey Redman, and Juma came to New York by way of the San Francisco Bay Area. In addition to those three, Earl played with numerous other luminaries of the time, such as Monty Waters, Charles Tyler, and Archie Shepp. He can be heard on Noah Howard’s essential 1969 album The Black Ark with Arthur Doyle on tenor sax, Leslie Waldron on piano, Norris Jones (Sirone) on bass, Mohammed Ali on drums, and Juma on percussion.

NOTE: A visitor to the website has reported to us that the alto player is Kalaparusha Maurice McIntrye, one of the original members of the AACM (Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians).